“Shreds” is a modest collection of brief verses, born amidst the daily routines of a bygone era, when I was ten years younger and the allure of rhymes held a sacred, yet fleeting, significance. In those days, the solitary moments I felt truly understood were those when the page, like a silent confidant, echoed back the words I dared to inscribe upon it. This anthology brings together poems of varied origins—some were penned in Italian, others remained only half-formed, and some arrived on paper as if by serendipity. Among them, some are cherished remnants of my past, while others evoke discomfort, perhaps due to their flaws or their once-pleasing melodies now discordant to my evolved sensibilities.

As with all my poetic endeavors, “Shreds” came into being through the random capture of inspiration. These verses were scribbled in the margins of books, recorded in the notes app of my phone, noted down in the pages of a planner, or scrawled on yellow scraps hidden away in a drawer. The title, fittingly, suits these fragments as though tailored to them: shards of days observed through the lens of an aspiring poet, a novice storyteller, a seeker of sensations, a wanderer, and a scholar lost amidst shadows of imitation and the gleam of fleeting hopes.

The collection is divided into three distinct sections, reflecting the evolution of themes and structures over time. The first part, spanning from 2013 to 2014, is marked by a conceptual and abstract approach that, in retrospect, may seem less polished. These early poems are the raw, unrefined thoughts of a poet finding his voice. The second part, dating from 2015, represents a shift towards mimicking my songwriting style, resulting in verses that are more readable and accessible, though still imperfect. The final section, from 2016 onwards, proudly showcases my development in storytelling and writing. Here, the poems exhibit a marked improvement in both craft and content, embodying the growth and maturity of my poetic journey. This progression underscores the learning curve and dedication that have shaped the evolution of my work.

To fully appreciate the essence of “Shreds,” I encourage readers to engage with these poems vocally, letting their sounds and rhythms resonate through your voice. Reading aloud allows the subtle cadences and intricate melodies to come alive, enhancing the connection between the words and your own experiences. As you journey through these verses, consider underlining lines that particularly touch your heart or evoke a strong response. You might also find it rewarding to mark these moments with small pieces of paper, leaves, or other mementos tucked between the pages—symbols of the verses that resonate with you most deeply. This personal touch can create a living dialogue between the text and the reader, turning each poem into a cherished, interactive experience.

Should you find yourself moved by even a single poem within these pages, I will consider my task fulfilled. For me, the true measure of success lies not in the quantity of praise or the collective impact of these verses, but in the ability of just one piece to resonate with you. If a single poem speaks to your soul or ignites a spark of reflection, then this collection has achieved its purpose. In that moment of connection, my role as a poet finds its deepest satisfaction, knowing that amidst the myriad fragments, one has found its rightful place in your heart.

Please note that you might encounter some formatting discrepancies within these pages. In my quest to preserve the integrity and flow of each poem, I opted to avoid having single lines or final sentences isolated on separate pages. This decision, alongside other editorial choices, may result in occasional inconsistencies in formatting. Such variations are not merely oversights but intentional elements of the presentation, meant to maintain the continuity and rhythm of the verses.

English is not my native tongue, and the imperfections that arise may defy the usual poetic license. In revisiting these texts after many years, I chose to preserve their original form—mistakes, oversights, clumsy rhymes, and ambiguous images remain as they were. Each shred represents a fragment of my being—my failings, my pride, my ignorance, my exaggerations, my earnest attempts, and both my successes and failures. They stand as testament to their origins, each a piece of the intricate mosaic of my evolving self.

May these verses endure as they first emerged, a testament to the imperfect yet sincere journey of an apprentice poet.

To the debris, For they tell the best of tales.*

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ShREDS__

SCRIBBLED THOUGHTS OF AN APPRENTICE POET

by Marco Delrio

smile

'Tis a time when I muse, “Perchance I err in some endeavor,
Or, mayhap, there’s aught awry within my spirit’s tether…”
And lo, it happens that, with toil, I scrawl almost in prose,
My usual and woeful happiness in its wretched throes.
And oft it happens that, in practice, this diplomatic sorrow,
May allure with its own creativity and tomorrow,
Yet adrift in a whiskey sour, a fragment of this soul I find,
Unearthed at the city’s sales, and left behind.
'Tis a time when I deem myself alone midst all that’s known,
And that my frailty’s too overtly shown;
And thus it happens, at times, I muse in this way,
That I am but sentiment and triviality’s display;
'Tis a time when hail in quatrains doth pelt my vehicle,
A constant chiaroscuro in Rembrandt’s miracle,
And a Camel Light steeps in a canticle so bright,
On Hesse, my Silvia, and Karl Marx’s insight.
Moments arise when thou feelest a touch of youth,
In the quietude of morn, and truth,
’Tis that thou ponderest, in the end, maturity’s prize,
More fitting for those with no regrets or ties.
And thus it happens, while still I lie and feign,
I sing for a few travelers in a wine bar’s domain,
Crafting smiles with lipstick upon the glass’s sheen,
And write, “This foulness shall pass, though unseen.”
It happens that snow descends in August’s sun,
On a Sunday, with uncertainties twirling as in Degas’ run,
And thus it happens, at times, I stay
With rhymes stifled behind a polka-dotted bow in dismay,
And hail in a verse while pondering time’s waste,
Swinging between a memory and its vain embrace.
My Mont Blanc falters in its canticle’s weight,
On Salinger, Beatrice, and Kant’s fate.
And ‘tis that, when meaning seems to lose its hold,
I lose my reason, my sleep, and grow cold,
I sing a world against the wind’s strife,
And within the assonances, I conjure my life,
A universe a touch different, where I might feign joy,
For time oft drags too slow, as shadows deploy.
And I lie on the cold cement, by a lamp gone dim,
Thinking, “Now I rise once more, as always, on a whim…”
And thus December falls as well,
And I lie on the ground with shadows, unsure why they dwell.

It rains upon the sun as we’re together
And words do glide upon my naught
‘Fore I see thy laughter tether
Even my stronghold, in hope, distraught.

‘Tis perhaps in making thee feel right
That I cling unto this present hour
For else I’d be bound so tight
In dreams of futile power.

If thou were not here, far and near
Between two arms that ne’er recall
How much it pains to hold thee dear
And all the things thou knowst not at all.

Another pale moon of mine doth wait
For tears exhausted, ne’er seen,
Though thy glance, at time, speculates
When I hide my smile ‘neath a sheet.

But, tell me, how much more must I say
To conjure in thee a vision that is fair
Of a breath, a shadow of my joy’s array,
Just in seeing thee, in thy stare?

At times, mayhap, I only doth lose
Or lose myself in cautious wait,
Mayhap ‘tis ‘cause in silence I choose
To live, if not mute, then mute I’d state.

If only a sky could erase all woe,
I’d steal the hues from thy speech’s glow,
And forevermore, wings I’d need to grow
To where I’ve learned to love and know how to love.

As when I find myself in search of thee
Within charred walls of another realm,
With tepid memories of lengthy gleeful speech,
In phrases of naught where joy doth overwhelm.

What price to leave thee happy e’ryday,
Brushstrokes of blue, scents of smiles,
And I, in the mirror, a mocking mirror I say,
To every irrational fate to which I reconcile

And as when I seek myself and find thee
‘N the next thought, adorned with light,
With languid resignation to the play scene
Of the faintly praising thee from ancestral plight,

Same plight, faithful companion of mine,
That for years, lives I say, I bear with desire,
Endure with desire, neither mine nor thine
But draped in pride, neither thine nor mine.

If sense it had, I’d explain the hearth’s warm light,
That moment you appear and my (he)art takes flight,
And like a horde of spiders in their crawl,
Another dream ascends, from chest to eyes of salt.

Approach I do, as always, clear and bold,
Yet in this murky corner, truth untold,
Even sweet reason flees its sacred hold,
Amongst foolish heart’s phrases, I’m enfold

For you’re not, nor will you ever be my all,
For if, by chance, I stray from common lore,
I’d be just a sun, admiring, deep and tall,
Your face, the galaxy of love I’d forever adore.

Not a day, not an hour fleeting,
Without thy constant tapping near,
Between words of circumstance, smiles fleeting,
'Tis hard to watch myself go sheer.
I smoke fate from a merry guise,
Often envying ash, the void,
Yet already I compose songs of malaise,
And you bid me cease to hate, annoyed.
Yet little dost thou know, for years,
I’ve forgotten how to heed that call,
A greeting would suffice, so it appears,
Sometimes I think, sometimes I swear, oftentimes all.
But two lifetimes wouldn’t explain my all,
So I clothe myself in ink, perhaps wiser so,
For now I’m hidden amid cobalt thrall,
Betwixt empty lean and a choice’s flow.
Not a minute, not a fleeting breath,
Without my stubborn dialoguing near,
When perhaps a smile of naught’s depth
Would serve, for ash hath marked me clear.
For if I were a greeting, I’d be my back,
Against thy wall, in autumn’s knack.

Who knows how many
Confess to the wind,
Silently screaming
To love you with meaning.

Who knows how many
Know, yet pretend not,
Branding fate
With silent consent

And, if I die tonight,
At least you’ll know,
For of me and us,
Only the body will go.

Of all I leave unsaid, little remains
That hasn’t been voiced afore,
Perhaps through glances, in familiar strains,
Those I break, then, with a “nevermore.”

Of all you’ve uttered, much I withhold,
Unable to articulate, for what reason?
Maybe from boredom, jest, or laziness bold,
Or simply from youth’s season.

Of those who could have held my hand,
Few truly clasped fingers tight,
Be it out of pity, hate, or demand,
Or perhaps out of sheer folly’s flight.

A thousand words I already know,
You care naught for, that’s plain to see,
For poetry’s not bread, my dear, although,
I’m aware, jest as well as thee.

But I cannot be a jester, I find,
So paper remains, the night, a bed of toil,
Years of joys left behind,
Yet unseen, wrapped in turmoil.

I retain the strength to leap one more breath,
And count your steps in another hall,
Dream of your eyes, now on another’s path,
I’ve laid down the arms you wished to see me enthrall.

For there are wars, me lady, I’m content to lose
And, perhaps, even to die,
Though from your moonlit bed, you may not choose
To know, I’m not yet ready to say goodbye.

How did I grow
Yet not grow great?
How did I feign
Importance’s state
As if ‘twere but a matter of age?
And discourse hold,
Of parties and cowardice bold
Though I’ve aged
Without maturity’s sage.

No effort, no constancy,
For beauty and ugliness alike,
Right and wrong, so’t seems be
Merely paths, paths to strike.

I’ve fallen once more
By hand so slight,
Stronger, whiter
And risen again in plight,
Just to fall once more
For in falling again
I came to understand
The scorch of the cry
Slaying the quiet ‘fore the land.

And I miss thee, though I speak it not,
Perhaps fearing to utter it aloud,
Yet miss thee I do and should not
For I know I cannot keep thee endowed.

‘Tis fine, it doth confound,
My constant self-deceit profound;
Mayhap thou art all the tales
I hide within my stories’ veils.

And I miss thee as always before
And know thou do not seek my door
Nor tread upon my path again
For thou hast seen me perish in vain.

In phrases of naught and dawns’ lights,
In heartdrops spilled upon stones slight,
In lakes of mud and mad epithets’ flight;

I miss knowing thee safe and sound,
Upheld by fragile embrace around.

Wrapped in sorrowed memories old,
I miss seeing thy smile unfold,
Even though for me be not,
In this tale of longing untold.

I know thou hearken the vastness ‘n the sand, this eve,
Seated by the river’s edge with all to declare
And I hear thee silent through mine eyes bereave
Whilst I linger in the frozen remorse of my errors’ snare

For thou art all I needed at the twilight’s hues
To wash away the prose of torment true,
Swallowed by the wind, stones upon a path,
Whilst I linger amidst another deceitful aftermath.

Thou art all that my evening required,
A firmament I conceal walking homeward,
Chewed by the rain of lights and discourse inspired,
Whilst I begin to forget the phantoms I once revered

And take me away from what thou dost call life
Now that ‘tis been felt the vastness of what I call life.

And I cling to all that I hold dear
Whilst ‘tis easy to say I need empathy’s embrace,
Whilst I think I know where I fall clear
Amidst the worn rhymes of a litany’s grace

And I grasp the hands of those I’ve harmed
As if I could imagine the forgiveness’ light,
A stranger, buried in linen, charmed,
Of a bed where I never truly slept at night.

Where is the meaning in all this plight?
For I cry it out in every tale spun
That I cannot find even a path, despite
How arduous, to return to thy days, once begun.

I cast my head into dreams,
Forgetting I can flee,
Sketching thy visage ‘n the clouds,
Thy fragrance on the sea.

And I shall leap from the glider
To lose myself in the air
As does the distant thunder
In collision with the blare

Of words and habits weary
I keep on walls so white
And damp, within my prison dreary,
Far from any light.

This is not thy place,
This land of rust and lime,
This realm of silent grayness
Tattooed on my wrist with time.

And 'twixt yellowed pages,
I hear thy name cry out,
Between the pillow and scarves,
Between hell and a route.

And I shall leap from the boat
Into oceans of hours vast
That I’ll waste with the pen
To give my pain a cast.

Then thou dost push me to the brink
Of what seems not real to me,
Leaving me empty 'neath the link
Of the taste of thy gaze to see.

I have sold my melodies
For countless wars I’ve lost,
Buried with a smile
And an epitaph of thy words embossed.

I dream with open eyes,
Butterflies, fireflies, sunsets’ gleam,
All that I once despised,
A perfect hell it doth now seem
Where I rend my skin
Toward blackened streams,
I sketch the stars I’ve seen
And strange sailing dreams.

They smile as if they knew
I trustn’t Cerberus true
And I feign to care,
I feign to matter,
Re-read letters anew,
Those yet to pen, t’be fair.

I have learned to forget
The act of smiling wide,
With a journey homeward set
And flowers for my stone’s sight
Without a pulse in vein,
Without pity’s pain.

Still,
In the pallor of a morrow
I cannot grasp,
Bound
To the cold rail
And its magnolia’s past,
Deprived
Of the privilege
To reply as I may,
I turn
Toward the murky sun
That swallows me away.

Swallow this gleam,
Forget the world,
We shall die in the noise
In the background unfurled,
Drinking bottles,
Forgetting the blood,
Shouting to stars
With voices as flood;

I survive with great strain
Attempting to hate thee
And life tires in vain
If forgetting should free me;
I waste me nights
On a thousand benches
With papers and dreams,
Beer and mint quenches;

I rewrite thy name
On the old blackened wall
Of a shop where thou buyest
Thy garments of gold
And I am upheld
By what we are not
And what we shan’t be
Though thou know I love thee.

And If I had a minute,
A single one, to finally explain,
It would be as I’ve dreamed
And cast into words again

Just to see thee once more
Painted in a mirror’s frame,
In a stolen photograph’s lore
For all my time the same

And if I could find a way
To truly halt the hours
And elude the meaning’s sway,
A whisper would hold the power,

Now that I walk alone
Through a melancholic reign,
Now that e’en the sun hath flown
Since thou didst departed ‘n pain

And they call it love,
I name it the daily chain.

‘Twas a long springtide to endure
Dwelling here alone
With all the winds whispering pure
What thou didst say one eve’s tone
Of how I would miss thy words
About the future unknown.

‘Twas a long summer to bide
Hanging upon the wall
And all the suns thou left aside
Ne’er were so cold, I recall,
And I tortured the minutes
With smoke and my chords’ thrall.

‘Twas a long autumn to breathe
And sleep with me and only me,
‘Mongst the pine needles and coffee dew,
Killing the hours, as I often do,
In a courtyard not mine, dear,
Lost in reverie.

‘Twas a long winter, to be kind,
To sink in mud and muddy snow,
Smiling at liquors and glasses of awe,
Sipping bitter smiles
In a city that has eyes,
Yet eyes that pain recall.

O, was it never-ending,
The year that like rain did descend
Though, round the corner, pending,
Lay two more years to contend.

Thou returnest in the smoke I breathe
And thou dost gaze with indifference;
Almost in jest I commence to think of thee,
Almost by accident I lose myself in semblance.

Thou collapsest on a sheet that blankly observes
And speakest of words already said
As if they were hidden messages,
As if they were phrases perfectly read.

Thou livest in the land I now design,
Strings upon wood, laments;
Perchance poets have spoken of such;
Perchance these are but ancient torments.

Tattered scraps of a heart that commands me,
That heeds not reasons’ claim
And I know ‘n the darkness I ought to remain
And I know I should simply forget thy name.

I breathe out, losing myself a measure
In the vast coffer I conceal
At the shore of a heaven I treasure
Which for ages I sing, feel, reveal;

A titanic leap I sought to make
Although of wax my spirit did dwell
For since the sun did vanish and forsake
Naught of my body remained to tell.

Running doth have meaning
When from cold thou art fleeing
A draught of night so gray
Left to die in dismay.

In a sorrowful moment seen,
By mistake, a vision keen,
The fate so inexorable,
Etched in marble, durable

Like blood upon the village square,
Heard by many everywhere,
Phrases echoed in the days
Of oblivion’s languid haze.

‘Fore a pinnacle I stand,
A coward self with banners grand,
With pride displayed in foolish glee,
Complicating all that be.

Life so bound by cords unseen,
Strong nor long, as it hath been,
I glimpsed the joy beyond the veil,
Noticed ‘em on thy wrist so frail.

To remain silent, oh, how tough;
Yet, to speak is harder enough.

The convictions of a madman fade
By the song of the final rain
That doth suffocate and change
Forever or by force’s bane
E’en the soul in strength’s domain

And thanks to a prose of iron wrought
That saveth me from cold’s cruel chain
Rendering me vast, yet great not at all,
Not old nor grand in any plane.

I sought to yield
To meaning ne’er discerned
In questions to gods,
In deeply buried chests,
In the gestation of dread,
In torments amassed
That served but pain,
Only to let thee in
The attic ‘twixt my ribs
Where restless still I seek
The taste of a kiss
Never found.
Never found.

Or, alas, the sound
Of the half of an hour
I dare not muse upon
To keep my wits within power,
Here, ‘neath star ceilings
Drawing days to be,
A tad too perfect,
With a head that sleeps
From mind to eyes
And truly sleeps
On thy breast, tonight.

But shall it be I who wills it so,
Shall it be I who believes in change,
Believing I can bestow upon thee
A crimson throne of dreams aglow,
In another universe, oh, so strange;

Shall it be I who seeks to reveal
The self I ne’er have been,
The self I wish to make real;
Dust, perchance, ‘neath thy mien,
Thy gaze, thy faltering stride,
Now slow, now with sorrow allied.

Shall I be the cloud
Thou hast forever despised,
In shadow and shroud,
Perchance to be realized?

I prostrate myself with joy anew,
Sparkling zeal and ardor true,
To the warmth of a dawn
That ignites the dreams I’ve drawn;
Were it but an obstacle
That needs but a single leap,
The shoes of clay
I still wear today
Bind me to the dirt so deep
So I try not, nor delay.

Perchance, I err,
For a single blow suffices
To change fate’s grim devices
And I fade, alas,
In pure white candle wax,
In rivers of warmth displayed
After an hour of vigil’s span
As if it were writ beforehand,
As if it were already lost,
As if it were thy dream’s cost.

As always, I prostrate
With that easy hatred,
Believing myself renewed
Now that I am but fed
On shame, a glance,
One finale glance
And I lie, overwrought,
Upon yet another sheet
Where still I live thee.

I do am mad as I appear,
Perchance morrow more,
Yet thou smilest when I sing
And singest when I speak
Thus I fade into the throng
While still I sense and feel
That subtle discourse
Of hinted logic strong;
Perchance I slumber within
For I have but learned
That each memory seems
Better than a dream’s end.
I clasp the hand
Of the shadow on the bed,
Carved out of the darkness
In our form’s stead.
How doth it feel
To know naught at all?
To not know of arriving
Day by day to steal
A part of me small.
I linger. Wordless
And nearly deaf,
Like a wall to a mirror,
Like a dialogue of eyes,
In search of courage,
Like the very first sprout
‘Twixt winter and winter’s surge.
Thou dost burst forth, at last,
Yank and drag, at last,
The inertia into the bramble,
Into another café,
Into a verse ‘bout thee,
Brushstrokes of pain and glee
And I know. I know.
But this I can do,
This and wait, I can do,
Sitting on shards,
Cursing thy name,
Kneeling on the signs
Of another season’s claim,
Lying on the fragments
Of another song’s remains,
‘Mongst nonsense and cascades,
‘Mongst panic, awe and strain
I am handling thusly
With words and words,
Carpets of words,
Pamphlets that burn
And tremble in a drawer,
‘Mongst cork and candles’ gleams,
‘Mongst caresses and silences
And the things ne’er said.
Still I seem to perceive, it seems,
The breath thou hast forgot
Wrapped ‘round the fingers
Of a trembling hand.
The dust greets me,
The walls chide me
And this track embraces me:
I now await a train
That passed years ago,
I sit yet still I shiver
For thy return again
In the steps I take,
In the school days,
In the gooseberries,
In the cemeteries,
In buckets of rain.
Worlds do fall.
All doth fade
A thousand times more.
A thousand times per hour.
Thou dost watch me
From within my skull
But it is late, my love,
And I am but a fool.

Still I walk and walk,
Wandering the old wide
And they say I be second, decried
Yet alone I now stride;

Still I walk and walk
Streets aplenty ‘low my feet
E’en if it be but a semblance fleet,
I halt not save as the lead hawk;

I walk and still I walk
If nights bring no illusions fair
‘Mongst a thousand embers there
I be the rugged, relentless rock;

And still I walk, evermore,
As this wine’s cup tastes of wood,
As they see I still walk for good
And halt at last, for the hour is o’er.

Leave me here, under the fourth stone,
Entombed in asbestos and insults.
Foolish was the echo of our murky love,
Bitter the draught of the serum we wrought;

We made a morrow of languid nevers,
Magic to sell to the blind seekers;
We sought the end ‘fore the prologue,
Protected by a false and fragile aura.

Oily dawns upon the roads o’ yesteryear,
Hyenas and vultures on darkened steels,
Faceless busts and heart-shaped papers;
They all sing where eyes cannot hear.

He sits again by the harbor’s edge.
Rain falls, drying on his every visage.
From the sea, the world pleases him
As he weeps crimson, cradled by a god.

Tell me if thou ceasest to live.

As if we were drops that lose their hold,
Sharing a journey, brief and bold,
With a sorrowful end
And a joyous tread
‘Till a cruel brow
Doth divide ‘em;
Thou, a tear;
I, a pool.

I pretend each wave shapes me,
To appear just – in other’s eyes
Until my last shred of remorse
Shall skim the shores of yore
And I, to fish for answers there,
And I, to sell them to questions

For to lose everything was a trinity
And t’lose me self was to find me here,
Here where I ne’er stood nor will
But where t’was always the contrary.

Only the quill doth move in sound,
Bouncing and erring as if with no hand,
For amongst all, I be the farthest bound
And just now beyond the station stand.

Deafened by the litany o’ the tracks,
I hardly think anymore these days
That amidst all, thou shalt lose me
For I am merely a traveler’s phase

And gentle breaths cry aloud
That those who halt thee are the same,
The tired faces of salt, they remain,
The old, red station, unchanged.

Tell me, doth death find thee speaking
Of all the world left unseen,
Of each day lost ‘neath the feet
Of another ungrateful voyager?

And already I miss thee, to say ‘tis much.
I breathe only out of weary old clutch.
Dreams of plastics, iron and asbestos decay,
Tears behind masks that wear through the day.

As when thou takest me hand without ask
Or turn behind, in the shadows we bask;
Seems yet yesterday I knew them anew
And smiled at thee from the glass pane view.

Now thou speakest, listenest, speakest again
And already I miss thee, ‘tis now a sharp pain;
The days are slow, reluctant to come
And upon me heart, like cement, they drum.

Thou art of blood and life, pure and sincere,
And e’ery smile brings the freshest of cheers.
I weep for my errors, at night, I lament,
But thy voices, even here, brings sweet content.

We died for two hours. Silent. Pale.
My trembling fingertips still lost
In weary hazel curls, frail,
As the darkness waited, crossed,
For the final dialogue was hushed
Yet we spoke without a sound,
Thou a leaf in cement crushed
Of my ravenous tread, unbound,
Of my eternal torment, rushed.
I asked to love thee. I replied.
Of flesh was our dream spun
‘Nd on me chest thou dost abide
‘Nd of it all I am ashamed, undone.

Seems it slips in fervor,
Cunning and wise,
Midst my e’ery error
Ever fatal, as time flies.
No waiting remains.
The crowd’s dispersed.
Still it rains.
It stalled in the grip
Of an uneasy mind
That yet doth fear it.
If it were a jest,
If it were naught,
If it were ill.

Free from any prejudice or aim,
I set me self to describe thee,
Evening leaping ‘yond the frame,
Darkness of thoughts twisted free,
Descending where ne’er before,
Had I got time to return
And rewrite it ‘n lore
In the moment it did burn
But I am alone, this alone I hold,
A whirlwind of remnants,
A slaughter of soul untold,
A music, some chambers;
And of what I wouldst give,
So little, if aught at all,
I have already bestowed,
Without ending, sighs,
Without a single review,
Only glimpses of life
And naught anew.

Seductive descends the eve,
The memories of pain,
Of wax-laden carts that heave,
An animal instincts’ reign.

It peers into the void,
The blurred pallor faint,
Weary it is toyed
And I weep in complaint.

Perhaps it deceives not,
Aware of the words
That surrenders a lot
To the verses I unfurled.

As when thou dost rain,
Glinting in asbestos sheen,
‘Nd move me away
From a final refrain,

Raven and frozen,
Curtains of smoke,
Another laugh unspoken
In clots that provoke

With the taste o’ deceit
Which I water with care
From the rigid grip
That I do not fear.

I have naught to lose.

If habits doth teach
And time wearies me,
The mind doth reach
To another constancy,

Castles of ends,
Serpents of threads,
Abstract confines
Of an eve last said.

It strikes me like a bolt.

‘Tis been said I’ll try
- Sense is in the trying -
And one memory alone
Can keep me from lying.

I have naught to lose.

Pride I don’t wear.

With dreams I’ll fare.

No sense I’ll bear.

And yet still I smile
Through my boulevards deft
That perhaps she awaits,
Perhaps she doth know.

Perhaps.

Perhaps again.

I have all to lose.

Love hath no haste,
Love hath no age, though,
For blood I still have
To pen down texts;
‘Tis four, the hour,
To stay awake deep
For love hath no slumber
And I picture thee sleep.

And I lose.

A pale sun doth glide through grimy panes
And salt flows unbridled, yet still the pain remains
For in me hands are quills but dreams I inscribe
And long I have lingered outside these gardens alive.

Only a sun encircles me with naught
Whilst the monotone sound o’ soles is wrought,
Echoing ‘n rhyme ‘gainst white walls it seeks
And I watch that part of me that slowly leaks.

Pure as the rising of a lightning flash,
For with today’s sun, it hath no match,
Yet like a thunder, a swift, savage light
Of a million hues did paint me heart bright.

Indeed, I drew benefit, not a doubt,
As from an April sun’s genial bout,
Like a blade that finds use ‘n a hammer’s fall
But destined for a pit in the courtyard’s thrall.

Thus were we, in ignorance steeped,
At the sun’s descent, my regrets heaped,
Thee, bathed in jade, magnolia, and gold,
At thy funeral, from the farthest desk, I behold.

Footprints,
Hands that yet seem to touch
The glass, the sky,
The air I crave so much.
Tables of hope
Deride me still,
I lie ‘n the heart of a saint
Hanged for theft ‘gainst his will.
Still gazing at the stool
I both hate and adore,
I feel its pull
And hands implore.
Fingers seize me,
Pierce right through,
Hung by an angel’s wrists,
I soar anew.
I steal one flight
Just to fall again
Where they lack the decency
To end my pain.

I descended immobile, as if in jest,
While breaths did spontaneously freeze,
Contests o’ strength ‘mongst muscles at rest,
I feel a log midst the fire’s seize.
Astonished variables to the constance
Of my unsteady self-control
For falling was my true brilliance,
Amidst the ruins, lacking a role,
Without a purpose, a star, a shore,
Millions of rafts await my tread
And only thou dost hold me oar,
The wind slaps my face instead
But sense hath no place in rancor
And hatred might find its rightful fame
But if in hatred we must anchor,
Hate me till love is its name.

Frozen dews lie still,
The whisper of silence’s breath,
The neck’s heavy weight at will,
Ere it rises from the rest.

Rust, ‘mongst my fingers, clings,
Habits that bind me tight,
The antisocial grin that springs
From knowing the future’s blight.

Blackness flows within my core,
Fire and smoke entwined,
Water, soap, a cleansing lore,
Hatred in silence confined.

I loathe the silent chore,
I detest the hush it brings,
O, hatred, be no more
For silence in hatred sings.

Machiavellian, I might declare,
And have no reason to deny,
For here I garb me self as a worm
To those who dare to defy.

The folly of the world I scorn,
From the very start of speech,
Renouncing capital letters bold,
Brother, here I abstain from reach.

But of foolishness you know so well
For still you remain blind
To the unveiling of Isaac’s tale,
And those who count in kind.

Yet in the end, no rancor remains,
For if I care, it is but pity,
And not the fires of passion’s claims.

But as long as I have wind,
As long as thirst will remain,
The most hidden illusion
At hearing your name.

Again and again. I feel it.
Fate trembling with zeal,
Seeking a bastion for me
Where I must dwell and heal.

I closed myself within a sign,
A priest’s tale to unfold,
Like a puff of perfumes
Among faces passing cold.

For such an instrument
My hand does not fear
Neither harm nor pain,
Nor ever bleeding, so clear.

And like a cloud, I come,
Like rain, you might say,
Like a false shepherd
Who only wishes to sway.

They closed me within
An untouchable net
Made of faces and opinions,
Of critiques and bitter regret.

I must depart
And I’ve yet to decide,
I’ve nothing but fear inside,
And the fastest of beating hearts.

Tell me words I do not know,
At this forsaken threshold,
An unexpected stay,
Infinite hands drag me away.

I perish, alas, in a kiss
But I do must leave,
So sincere’ll be the pain
That I may not return again.

I must depart.
Now, I have to start.
Now that it makes sense
For in a moment, it will not.

I’ve found already what I sought,
Yet see me strive for more in view,
Masking pain, by fears uncaught,
With the sarcasm lost to you.

Since you chose the distant road
And found yourself with empty hands,
Pockets full of lies and stones,
At the first toll of the bell to stand,

And I recline, quite content,
Within my cradle of mad glee,
Knowing well thy present’s torment
For I am but honed sociopathy.

Remind me of the reason why
For cries that stun and draw me nigh,
That lay me low upon the ground,
Empty, weary, path unwound,
After deer have fled ‘n flight,
With no answers brought to light
To questions you ne’er did ask,
Only scabs from wounds that bask
Inflicted by blind marksmen’s aim,
Hired by error, void in claim.
In a tangle o’ nothing I lie,
Yawning, bowing, dreaming to die,
Dreaming no dreams will find
A resting place within my mind.

They fall, with no premonition,
A quadrille’s final position,
A thousand suns, a single dial,
Quartz and ash o’er earth defile.

In serving thee, I bloomed a rose
To meet what expectation knows,
And contrariwise, as oft I did,
Trite and posthumously hid.

The monologue gives me its due.
They watch with eyes devoid of dew.

The darkness, wooden in its tone,
Ignores the crowd, as I’d have known,

And only darkness lingers on.

Pales, the noise in sudden flight,
Like the last eves I’ve lost from sight,
Cast into thought, forgotten, fey,
Yet still alive, although far away.

Ink ‘n me quill, and countless schemes,
Rhetoric in adamantine dreams,
I prostrate ‘fore the comprehended,
Inefficient, although defended.

We were absolved with nary plea,
At the hour of English tea,
Spirits laboring, sweat’s decree,
Like dying beasts in agony.

Methinks I’ll let myself now sleep,
In warmth of memories, dark and deep,
Feigning mildness, feigning death,
Gulping slow with languid breath.

From mahogany dark and old,
A scent arose, so soft and cold,
Extinguished thoughts, dimmed the light,
In depths of sleep, lost from sight.

Yet in the deepest of dreams, I found
The sea and cliffs where waves resound,
Fireflies pass through bushes bright,
The whispers of wishes ‘n the night.

A moment brief, two lives entwined,
Awoke me then, me hands confined,
Chilled and trembling, head held high
In your portrait’s watchful eye,

And what is left at dawn’s first ray?
A moat of sand, a fleeting day,
A paper plane adrift in flight,
A Monet on a napkin’s white.

Now that thou art no longer near,
Thy presence yet I feel most clear.
Thy joy alone doth higher stand
Than my own life, by Fate’s command.

Strange it is, this Monday new,
Without thy scorn, so oft I knew.
“’Tis fine,” I lie to the mirrors’ eyes,
Pretending all is as the night.

For I have slept in restless state,
Replaying moments, early, late,
The unusual routine, our fleeting art,
The only gift I can impart.

How many words could I bestow
With but a glance thou’dst surely know?
And yet thou speakest, talk and talk,
While I, a fool, in dismay, balk.

Perchance I grasp it now, or not,
In love’s embrace, my soul is caught,
To drown within a drink’s despair,
In trifling words that fill the air.

No sense it makes, or maybe so,
To scream within me chamber’s glow;
Upon the wall “Life’s like this”,
Though one such life sufficeth me.

How many words I have to share
Yet write in silence, unaware?
While thou dost speak, thou dost part
And I, a fool, still, with a silent heart.

Stay. This I pray, a moment more,
Where time itself doth halt and adore
And all is simple, all is new.

Lie to me, my only love, make it true.
Say this moment will ne’er wane,
This perfect moment, free from pain.

Then hide me in a dream’s embrace
For thus, my dear, I’ll leave no trace.

Sweet and bitter, the strange descent,
Thou didst weep at dawn’s lament,
How long dost thou in vain lament,
I gaze at thee, in doubt, intent.
Not even I know what I feel,
Thou art yet another cloud,
I shall sleep in thy bramble’s reel,
As ever, no blackberries, no doubt.

I care not how but where I wend,
Semantic landslides and poetic blend,
A meager booty for this Hercules,
Predicted fates of many years.
A carom of opinion flows,
Nonsense and critiques disclose,
And explanations I abhor
For they trouble evermore.

Corrupt’d by the dawn’s delay,
So vague, yet true, in precise array.
I sketch on paper sounds anew
And thou dost ask if madness grew.
To answer brings no peace, thou’rt wroth,
Demanding truth, thoul’lt second both,
Perchance ‘tis true, and thus thou sigh,
And I alone, the world passes me by.

Another night, I find me self once more
In the darkness of a missing lore,
A shred of life, unchanged it seems,
Yet in the laurel of idle dreams,
If I repose in boredom’s guise,
Masked as sloth ‘fore weary eyes,
A silent tale then doth unfold
Of my slow pace ‘midst stones of old,
And so I run whilst standing still,
Speak of naught and speak I will.

Seismic is me sudden deed
When I a sheet o’ parchment need,
Me tread’s telluric, fierce and wild,
Cast straw upon the fire, compiled
Which burns unseen, in hidd’n might,
With oxygen, the rhyme alight,
Introspective, as the hours near,
I see the thread hath no end clear,
And still I voyage ‘mongst the schemes
That shout ‘n’ bind me to me dreams,
To spit forth cryptic curses dire,
To free the demon from its pyre,
It wakes at dawn upon me bed,
This_storm o’ madness I have said,
Semantic quakes, mere songs o’ pain
In hermetic agony’s reign, I say,
Whence more I draw when sinks the sun
And thou dost see, thou know’st, each one.

A turning point, the fates unkind,
Thou promised me a darkened fate,
Yet every glance reveals to find
The selfsame face I did berate.

We bargained low, I questioned why
Among the felines, hound doth stray,
And now, me coffee cups pile high,
I ponder still, and rue the day.

From the light most unusual,
In fate’s secluded nook,
Before we return to where
The minute doth slowly crook.

False prints ‘pon a throne
Of pale and ancient ivory,
Stirring art in circles known,
While in the pen, so dreary.

The same old gestures,
In perpetual courtesy’s guise,
Do naught for the heart that flutters
And bursts ‘neath the infinite eyes.

None to blame, none to censure,
In the throng where faces blend,
For it is not the heart’s pleasure
That these endless faces mend.

I kick a leaf as though it bears
The fault for all my frozen woe,
And peace doth choke me with its snares
While scorn and torment, deep, they flow.

Two paces lone I take,
Me shoulders drawn with pride,
To lift me chin and make
These two steps me guide.

Faces pass weary and pale,
Same hues as dusk’s embrace,
Perhaps a stroll through the square
To banish sorrow’s trace.

Like a wandering hound,
With false assurance I stray,
Meandering all around,
Yet concealing me dismay.

Only two paces more
To find me way at last
For ‘tis not sleep I deplore
But knowing I could, alas.

…but then did rose arrive at the day’s end,
And I greet it from the smoke of a wall
While the eye doth close,
In echo and repose,
From the darkest sky,
Feathers of twilight fall.

When a tempest roars o’er the ocean wide,
And I drown, and die, and live, unaware,
Nor heed the storm’s unyielding tide,
As I drift on phrases, light as air.

In bread of words, I find my flight,
I lose myself in written lores,
No longer harmed by thoughts of blight,
When tremors of suspense implore.

For I do am dead, doubts do weigh,
So ponder deep what I might lose,
When in the realm of thought I stray,
And in such musings, I may choose.

Upon the final pale, white light,
Weary are these straining eyes;
Time, thou art but a cross in plight,
A stern judge to my verse’s cries.

When I reach out with will, yet lag,
To cruel morn’s devouring feast,
I face an unusual hunger’s nag,
Embracing the corpse of a beaten beast.

Reluctant yet exalted, I hold my stance,
Consistent though lies have vexed,
In search of thorns in a rose’s dance,
Which to flames I cast, enjoying the pyre’s text.

Though silence reigns in cosmic sphere
And I strive to shun such thought,
Reluctant still, as dawn draws near
With a black sun’s sole light distraught.

And on the last loud, shouted cry,
My vanquished eyes find their end;
Faith, thou art but a crutch to lie,
Though limp, thy denial I defend.

I sink in a bucket of briny tears,
A mere relic of memory’s fold,
Virgin of love, aware naught’ll appear
In this frame where no warmth holds.

And on the final gesture, same as before,
Dreams of a man are torn asunder;
Life, thou art but a grandiose lore,
Entropic in a void’s wandering thunder.

Lingering in a vague recall
Of a phantom’s fleeting gleam,
A breath of light did fall,
Reflected in the mirror’s beam.

Stubborn and passive, I remain;
Church bells toll in distant chime;
Weary and stripped from earthly gain
Of a burgher’s cloak and grime.

Evil eyes and clouds aloft
Caress the sky with darkened hues;
I fear my descent, too soft,
Before my destined time is due.

There I was seen and understood,
Yet how to keep them far away?
Fearful I tread on diamonds good
And let myself in dimness stay.

A brooding hen, I guard the thoughts
Of a kind, a genre, hard to erase;
And though I promised in past aughts
To show tact and earnest grace.

To smile sincere, to cleanse in milk,
In mortar and stone to find my way;
The statue turns with grip of silk,
Bends me with a firm array.

We stood amidst the rising blaze,
Calm thy spirit, for heart doth ache;
The stars already know our phase
And what fate for us shall make.

The sneer of malice, wings of soot,
Yellow-tipped in a lonely station;
Meanwhile I burn ‘midst e’ery foot,
I heed commands with sharp elation.

No longer can I walk this plane
As I perform my dance in vain.

Thus, do I venture into cryptic lore,
If ancient tongues I fail to render clear,
Strange ‘twas to present me self more
In thoughts of yore, from centuries austere.
A foolish rhyme doth serve as bond,
‘Twixt heed and pride, a fragile bridge;
Yet thoughts do quake, a touch beyond,
With tremors more than erst they did.

The errant sun of October’s crest
Through weeping willow leaves doth peer,
Rests upon our talk unblessed
Of days not yet, but drawing near.

Thou ask’st me when one doth expire,
For sunset’s price, no coin can claim,
Each last light paints a scene higher,
Despite the lace that veils the frame.

From yonder room, on floor the first,
Where gentle mistral whispers low,
Silence strange and scents accursed
Of hospital’s harsh, sterile woe.

Yet still thou believest, firm and true,
That thy god may still intercede,
That some one hearkens unto you,
As prayers in prose you there recede.

I muse on Nietzche, silent stay,
Whilst thou dost speak to cleric grim;
He offers thou his dreadful way,
A potion vague to solace him.

Then mother-in-law with flowers drear,
With glances past, the moments gone,
I see the nod, outside I peer,
Pressed against the glass at dawn.

O, would I could gift the scent
O’ rainy streets where we did roam,
To wander as the smoke once bent,
On beach where we found our home.

Thine eyes lone in answers gaze
Unto ruins of me thousand queries,
If but more time, or just a phase,
A moment yet our life reveres.

They told me love’s to watch one leave
From this life’s fleeting foolish flight,
And I now watch thee as I grieve,
Thou art eternal, still, in night.

Flies of butter and unsteady gut,
No more the chill of this December I feel,
Hazy with smoke and Saint-John’s Wort,
No more the absence of some present real.

Thou taught’st me to converse ‘n silence cold,
The cold of winter, now ageless within me,
That blends elderflower and absinthe bold
With the intellectual sloth of coffee.

I dwell bent o’er the scent of ink’s ghost,
Now faded ‘midst apologiae o’ never,
Repeating ‘em in cloisters, pacing lost
‘Mongst puddles of frivolities and endeavor.

For grown I ain’t been yet always only aged
In a carousel of lies and winding halls,
In a house where answers have been caged,
And all is left to vultures’ beaks and claws.

Thus, I watch the snow that knows me not,
From the cage of doubts thou art aware,
Feigning wellness ‘nother fleeting slot,
Feigning a heart in stand-by’s care.

From railing moist to glassy sands,
I gather sounds of my tedious day,
With gaze enraged, hungry and bland,
Hands on the page to while away;
The dew descends from elm so shy,
Meets friends upon my shirt anew,
And a cold sun doth in the ditch lie,
Where I sit drenched in apathy’s hues.

The usual verses, lost in taste,
A different sense, a hint of thee,
‘Midst the scribing now misplaced
And thy confusion, your majesty,
And my back is trapped in the ditch,
No shadow of ascent to see,
The night hurls its stone on me,
Heavier than life, I decree.

As if it changeth aught, this fleeting hour,
As if each moment brings its solemn might,
As two leaves on a carpet of dull power,
A darker visage doth wait in the night.

Among a thousand dawns I saw it rise,
Like an axe ‘gainst a branch’s mocking grin,
Like a cloak on a post ‘neath the skies,
And yesternight’s croak, alone within.

Yet far doth thunder the morrow’s call
On glassy slabs with a soul in a cup,
Feigning more gravely, in straw I stall,
But wings fear not the faded habit’s flap;

Weary they settle on sleeves now torn,
They gaze, they speak, seem to comprehend,
These eyes of mine cannot adorn
The mount’s light, too soon it doth end.

Again I lie in the bed’s embrace,
Resting on the void I in chest conceal,
Believed I in hope’s whispered grace,
The evening’s shout, the night’s ordeal.

‘Mid cats and pavements by sun decayed,
‘Mid countless thoughts in words so few,
That mayhap wound, and so I said,
That mayhap heal when I thee view.

A world more fair than thou know’st not,
Coloring with hands not thine,
Frozen I lean, my wings are caught,
Fragile and black, alone in line.

For alone I am, with thee I stay,
Mayhap I desire, alone with thee, this way.

Correspondences, stale, futuristically,
Slip through days long and the same,
And though I spread ‘em, o, artistically,
Pamphlets themselves can’t cure this bane,
For few have spoken with fiery might
That I ignite as I cry, scraping the pave
Of paper and graphite, scattered in spite,
In games that mere written jest enslave.

The hallway rejoices with me echoes anew,
Today, as I climb more distant and slow
To the murmur o’ wait that gentler doth strew,
Cruel still, the sound of the piano’s low;
Amidst the same gestures, thorns at me brow,
Thou say’st they’re mere unexpected scars,
And time’s course fills, ever so now,
My white tub with sinister bars.

Had I a pair of mystic wings,
Or like Icarus, but wings nonetheless,
Perhaps with mere ballistic flings,
To fall into thy hands, I’d confess;
For strength in such no writer claimed
Nor hath it been recited wide,
At the hour o(f)a headlong plunge_aimed,
None reach the crux where truths reside.

Early blades of autumn, red and keen,
To stir the sleep still cling’n’ (to) my mouth,
I stretch my shoulders, my ears; its touch…
The maestral now unsettles me,
And lays me down, the fool I seem,
Who at the last skilled dart he nocks,
Brings hand to quiver, knuckle mocks,
And hits the void with a subdued gleam.

Seasons swiftly pass at pace
And here I stand on dampened rock
Like that fool, waiting with cue,
In hand, for some bite, lost in thought.
I think perhaps a compromise
‘Twixt me and this fool, my mind strains,
Not to ponder, wind and rains,
On the same rock, drop by drop.

The gusts have brought me clues
That I prepare to weave,
A labyrinth of virtues and of ruse,
And an unknowing self to perceive.
Hold me back from explanations
As I descend the pebbled way,
Like a plunge of great precision,
To’rds the lofty sky o’ miracles’ sway.

The gusts did bring me blooms
Which I discern not from the souls
Nor sepulchers in colored plumes,
Nor lifeless bodies in their shoals,
In the frenzy of what’s solved
That collapses into assent,
And the trivial resolved
Under payment most content.

Thus, I clutch the lone boulder
In the ocean of grains ahead,
Bluish skies with veins of red,
Crimson strokes of regret spread
To which I cling in suffering;
Easy it can ne’er be,
If hard ‘twas the departing,
But harder still to admit to me.

Tangled fingers restless be,
Aware o’ their duty to haul ‘way
The rest from the thorn’s decree,
Ruthless thicket’s cruel foray.
From a palace of rocks it clasped
Him close, almost a love’s embrace,
To keep him from fall’n’, it grasped,
Like lemon drops on parchment placed.

Where is the study, now,
Now that thee feels the weights
Of hangin’ queries, as thou,
Upon the brink of fate?
Perchance thou lean’st to’rd the dusk
Of a harbor with words to trust,
With words of comfort’s sort,
Knowing God’s only fault.

Megaliths of eternal plight,
Chilled by the task to drag,
Unmoved by the thorns’ spite,
Cunning of the rose’s snag
That from its glass doth spy
And envies the sea below
Into which he wished to fly,
In foam, in mirth, in death’s flow.

We paused by the spirits’ gleam,
‘Neath the neon’s awkward shroud,
‘Midst the hues of a heaven’s scheme
That veils the colors proud.

Beyond, a hound, half asleep,
Soiled, dissonant and grim,
‘Mongst shards of crystal deep,
Sands and sieves within.

And down the bridge we tread,
Born of glue and chances,
Of sword-bearers and pests;
Yet it stands and grants.

To shadows. We were naught
For more than a fleet’n’ greet,
For already thoughts were wrought
With doubt’s absence complete.

And then, beneath the sea,
Thou did say ‘twas supreme,
Did hope be years o’ this it,
Without a word, without a dream.

The clouds reside within alone
While August flames the panes aglow,
We sip the waiting ‘midst the stones,
Chewing o’er promises unstable and slow.

Had I desired time once more,
I’d have sworn whilst running, see,
For time may be the only lore
That amongst all things doth flee.

Waste it not on a lengthening cord,
As but I lengthen my coffee’s draught,
For September then forgets, accord,
What once we were, our paths now distraught.

We art unstable and more frail
Than tears in October days,
Sadistic, with no avail,
In speaking with but words a-twain,
And my verses now lie strewn
‘Cross miles that now do seem
A mosaic of cobblestones hewn,
Where my dreams collide in beam.
We art skillful and most stubborn
As November’s winds so fleet,
With migraines ‘neath the willows,
Ending all in naught complete,
And my dreams are torn asunder
By the miles that I do tread,
To see us transformed yonder,
Where others strangely speak instead.

How little green the park tonight,
‘Midst rain, lamplights and nostalgia’s hues;
So little I seek the acrylic bright.

How sad and far’s spring’s fleet’n’ flight,
Unworthy of the melancholy due,
Yet my predictable verses ignite.

How visibly my back doth bend
‘Midst floors of painted cheer and glee;
‘Tis worth returning, hysteria to mend.

How untamed and proud dost thou ascend
To scribble tears away from thee,
Yet leave the furrows on thy face penned.

How distant from the border’s blend,
‘Midst junipers and magic feigned;
So far we seem pathetic, my friend.

How mad, then, those who despair send
Like me, we, who in madness reign,
Must thank our foes, and to them bend.

This eve, rain doth upwards flow,
Yet ne’er towards another’s woe.

Thou art wont to remain, to shun me plight,
As if for years thou hast so trained,
As when I voice me woes and pains,
Thou heed’st only thine own quiet flight.
Though I strive and show me wounds still bright,
Thou proceed’st in spasms unrestrained,
Far from laying down thine arms of might.

‘Tis eleven o’clock, perchance, e’en e’erywhere,
When rain doth fall with the sun’s bright grace,
And we seek the right words to embrace,
The truth, amidst another tempest’s glare.

The clatter of cobbles and soles does share,
In silence, no passerby doth be in dance,
And I pretend a singsong to enhance
Whilst thou liest ‘midst violets, rare.

These hours, same as many, I do declare,
I’ve learnt to guard ‘em with steady might,
As a serpent in its coils, holding tight,
With resolute gaze, absent, rare.

‘Tis eleven o’clock, I proclaim with care,
When schools shut down ‘n their rite,
And we seek the right words to alight,
To bring our tale to its end and fare.

I glance at the heavens, just for a breath,
And foresee a past that’s turned to myth,
Still I reason in old lires, just as if I be
My grandsires at the trading bench.

I leave the dream and the hopes I bear,
For another day, more bright, and yes, rare,
Today, the rain with sun doth flare
On the west wind, in its tempered air.

‘Tis twelve o’clock in an hour, I swear,
And sing firm ‘pon the rocky shore,
With drops and sun ‘midst this lore,
And I ignite, wet, alone, and yes, rare.

‘Neath trees, forlorn, and turning pale,
In twilight’s deepening, early shroud,
I train my voice, though quiet and bowed,
My warm hands ‘twixt garments frail.

A thousand thoughts, the river’s tale
Of days spent scribbling idle cheer,
No talent shown, but a cross it seems,
Their ebb and flow in sorrow’s vale.

Faint and wet, the words unveil
From pens, as steps do strain and tire,
‘Twixt tiles, stained with russet fire,
The waiting’s sweet, no cream to hail.

Yet, oft it wounds, this slow travail,
As time and tedium deceive
How oft our spirits grieve,
And like yellowing trees, I grow frail.

I dwell ‘twixt veils of whitewashed walls,
Or hours past, or so it seems,
Where no glass now doth catch the gleams
As beneath its shroud, I crawl

Towards a grim and dismal hall,
I shun the thought, as if the neck
Would lighten in the walking trek
To leave the shadow, somber pall.

Thus, I return, to gaze anew
On lives resolved with greater grace,
And carry glances, stowed in place,
‘Neath eyes that show how choices rue.

Indeed, the winter takes its due;
Autumn’s brief as November’s rains,
Though cold winds bring the winter’s strain,
And I slide through leaves and sleet’s faint hue.

In this crucible of toil’s stew
Where I cannot cleanse my woe
As the Arno’s flood doth overflow,
Perhaps, for thirty years, I rue.

Perchance I am too foolish, too,
To fear the pains and losses dire,
Too long within myself to tire,
As autumn yields to winter’s view.

The grayish giant rocks me with might,
Completely ignoring my morning fare,
‘Midst vacant chairs, stark and bare,
As if aware of the monster’s plight.

An impassive glance, cold and terse,
From the officials, swift and stern,
As I struggle to show credentials earn,
Yet receive no heed, nor converse.

Local tongues in countless hues
Fade with the changing of the train,
And further on, another serpent reigns.
I ponder days. All the same news.

Those of the servants, whatever the scribe,
They’ve treasured the broth of mundane,
Of ennui and woes, in visions lain,
Wiped away in the hold’s bribe.

The whistle comes past the pane,
Ripped by the yellowish drape
That since the morn did narrate
Of a festival day’s parades.

It sways and staggers, bends low,
And twists upon its metal core,
Borders of maps, yet I dance once more
As if ‘pon the highest peak, aglow.

The hours drag and seem to stall
As I sit in my reflective space,
Yet, swiftly, perhaps with bitter taste,
Or perhaps I am again at a crawl.

We seem to be ‘n lands I hold dear,
Yet scattered flaws appear,
Burnt rocks eroded by time near,
They force me not to tarry here.

As if in scant, fleeting chance,
To truly make a gesture bold,
I’d find a way to quickly fold
And let my heart in here enhance.

Melancholic and futile, then, I reset
My sitting, somewhat astray,
‘Twixt the electric breeze and the dismay
And my attire, dark as the nights’ threats.

Some ascend, some have departed,
Few stops remain ‘til we arrive,
But of this place I shall not write
For they’ll soon have me occupied.

As hero, as idol, with gravity, I descend,
Serious, with my baggage in tow,
Both metaphorical and unlucky woe,
With which I live, and struggle to mend.

There were simple matters
To which no solutions you found,
And as autumn’s shade did gather,
We had to try and not to drown.

May brought dreams anew,
Upon the world’s edge, so vast,
And we showed it the last,
Without words, a silent view.

But when, in the grand design,
Mute was the farewell we gave,
And no reply came, you’d cave,
And darkness in your eyes did twine.

Languidly, you let go.
I watched in calm repose
As you fell, without pause or prose,
Into the white foam, like a mermaid’s glow.

Days passed, and I remained
On morning’s green, still and still,
Upon the world’s edge, as fate fulfilled,
As you embraced your destiny, unchained.

At home, the tea’s scent is missed
For days uncounted and gone;
You’re the only one to whom I’ve drawn
My tales, the only one who’s dismissed.

March, then, came, swift and unkind,
With summer’s greed in its wake,
And the sweater as my cushion of sighs,
On the world’s edge, where I’s born to ache.

The ifs and buts, with whirlwinds,
Speeding and screaming, still intrude.
I’m finding myself still sitting still,
Not avoiding the lightnings’ feud.

January harbored only sadness,
And fortunately, I had a vacant pack,
With pockets worn, and time to track,
Too much time, always too slack.

Venice still waits, impatiently,
But like me, lost track o’ the days.
For days and days, from the world’s edge’s gaze,
The void awaits your return, stupidly, faithfully.

Reward me as thou deem’st alright
If thou canst liken this deed,
To ruin so complete, indeed,
The void thou dost feel in the night,
If thou pretend’st thyself to save
When the descent begins to weigh,
After the same turn of the wave,
Thou didst feel the shove, so near, yet fey.
None, perhaps, as close as I,
Who spoke no false but dark decree;
Like me thou liest, in the sigh
Of wrinkled palms, ‘midst birds that prey.
For captains, thou dost know, have seen,
Through ages past, both fierce and keen,
But ne’er such fangs as mine displayed;
So close them up, let ‘em be stayed,
For in navigating wide and far,
One loses the end, the guiding star.

They all depart, I sit upon the faint
Smile that I, despite, do wear,
Wondering if I am at all aware,
I rise, I fly, I fall, and then stay,
With paper leaves dried by day,
From winter’s last month, spent,
From which I steal its lament,
And cold words to describe hell my way.
Here I stroll, as in garden paths,
With measured steps, nearly still,
To not tread upon the violets’ will,
Sown with hope and restraint’s arts.

Surprise me and feign thy love,
Stand steadfast and lay down thy sword,
Remain unmoved ‘midst the alarms’ roars,
And clench thy fists, learn to rise above,
As in the many films you mention,
Where you weep and for attention hope,
Perhaps though you show no signs of affection,
You merely wish to hold me close.

Perhaps I am but one of many,
Cynical, alone, with regrets uncanny,
Perhaps the crowd in the stands
Adheres to the notes with glue-like zest,
And I err with class, and live in strife,
Awake in class ‘midst students’ lives,
At the back desk with those who fail
And the saint of the hour, snob and flailed.

This is how to live beyond twenty’s span,
How to part ways, not count the scars,
And they’ll fail me too as I advance,
As I lack favor from the teacher’s glance,
For years pass, and I live with woe,
And they know I know not how to show,
And perhaps it’s truer than I grasp or remember,
When I’m conjugated to the now,
Peering at names on the list somehow,
Knowing that life’ll make me resit in September.

The heavy head, upon the body lain,
Adorned for festivity, in anxious strain,
Resting sorrowfully on the frozen glass,
And seeming distant, still, I pass.

I wait for thee, for hours, warm in my coat,
Within my breast, the thunder of huntsmen’s notes,
And I conjure words, my mind does bounce
On the glass now warmed, and I halt the room’s expanse.

My hands do tremble, faces weary-eyed,
‘Midst the dogs that pull, with gaze cast aside,
From the frozen glass on the square of the fallen,
If thou shouldst arrive, my teary eyes would soften.

Bruises and stains, of blows and coffee spilled,
I saw thee in thy carriage, ‘round three, I think,
Thou turned thy eyes, and then I knew, in truth,
The mere thought or dream is enough, my sooth.

I await from the well, this rainy night,
Within my breast, the dogs now do fight,
And by the glass I stand, life’s face does alight,
Paying respect to those below, in the square’s light.

Only the memory of the day remains,
Of stale bread concealed in the oven’s chains,
Regret assails me, lost ‘midst flocks forlorn,
Of bitter tears where thou didst linger, worn.

I don black, with gaze most absent and bare,
And, truthfully, I speak of the present affair,
If I say I see, ‘midst the crowd’s distant glare,
Thy solemn eyes wandering far, unaware.

The tolling hands on my bedside tick
Near lethal recipes with flaxseed thick;
How many a discourse we spoke of the void
To a crowd still deaf, yet not destroyed.

I don sorrow’s guise, if I speak thou dost fade
‘Midst a thousand mosquitoes, confetti, and shade,
And perchance thou dost read what I scribe:
If thou hadst stayed, I might still be alive.

Hannah dreamt of being unlike the rest,
And of having cause to raise her cry,
Enclosed within the seaside nest,
To paint her brow and wonder why.

Hannah longed to see the brine
Leave its marks upon the glass,
And draw her right hand in the line
Of her breath, as moments pass.

Hannah knew the cost so dear
Of having dreams of parchments,
And drawers filled with garments
Too white for the festive cheer.

She knew well the pride of those
Who recite all of Dante’s verses,
Yet blushed at singers’ songs
‘Bout the longings of silly loves.

Lost in storms beneath the skies,
Still she waited, calm and sure,
For a knight with swords of words,
As time cruelly drifted by.

Hannah feared no ill to bear,
If ill was the groundwork laid
For summat better, a stage
Of mental peace, beyond compare.

Hannah dreamt of morrows new,
And of treasures to hold tight,
A life to learn, a life to write
With hands that crafted dreams and truths.

I begin again, from the ashes still warm
Of a failure, foreseen and sure,
With hopes that now be of less firm form,
And answers be more satirical, obscure.

I was born to lose, to feign,
That all is well, to seem not a fool,
Yet find comfort in laughter’s vein,
Know you not, each rank needs its tool.

Aye, it is I, always I, so fraught
To seek the reasons and the blame,
To investigate who hath sought
To steal my gilded throne, my name.

I begin again, from the stained abyss
Of errors escaping in streams,
My morale only slightly amiss
As hopes ignite once more in dreams.

‘Twas an eve like many more,
I swore.
The sink still full, forlorn
Till morn.
Ere sinking into fleece,
Then released.
Since I’ve been alone, ‘tis the tale
Of pale
Routine: you with someone,
Undone.
Better, with fewer words:
It hurts.
More than a dark, brooding gaze,
I’m amazed.
Your flavor. Pain.
Be then, damned night,
Alight.
Plague-bearer ‘mongst streets and thoughts;
It rots.
If past,
You seemed a herald,
Imperiled.
Now dread,
You seem a thousand stern headsmen.
Be it. Amen.

I watch thee grow,
Stronger than e’er I was, I trow,
For sustained by mere illusions,
I offer thee but dull confusions.
Were I star ‘mongst the best of tutors,
Ne’er would I teach thee to bid farewell,
For thou art more significant now
Than e’er I was, or could tell,
Nay, more than e’er was God himself.

I loosen me shirt to muse,
As though I might choose
Uniform talks, less bitter to peruse,
With paranoias I can’t defuse.
At least, the inks calm the seas,
For an hour, with its fragrant breeze
Of toasted almonds and brine;
Almost taste it’n me mouth and eyes.
The table, cold and dull,
‘Tween head and floor doth lull,
Perhaps the only thing to stay
From letting the spirits decay.
The same ol’ songs from school,
Those we etched on desks as rules,
Those we still whisper growing gray,
Those in which we gently swayed.
Now, after eons, hear’n’ ‘em near
From the last tread o’ me sole so clear,
To’rd the gate ‘n’ the world beyond,
My stomachs churn, in slow despond,
More than your tobacco’s burn.
I want to share our wounds once more,
At least a noon, on your terrace floor,
One last time, as in days o’ yore,
When we felt grand, though we’nt for sure,
For greatness bears trials, you know,
The consequences, as they surely show.
I wonder where thou placest thy glass
Now that thou hast moved to ‘nother pass,
Now that I can see thee still
From me window, as time stands still.

With hands in pockets I tread,
Gently caressing the walls ‘round,
For they ne’er shun me, nor shed
My secrets they keep safe and sound.

Courtesy’s left hanging from a wall
Next to my scarves, in shadow I slip,
Now, wishing to wear out my soles
On this endless pointless trip.

The marble white gives no heed
To the questions I pose in vain,
In gravel it doth blend, indeed,
And a solemn greeting I feign,

While my legs, they move with care
Through a square too grey for cheer,
For in winter’s far too wide and scared,
In July ‘tis packed and near.

There now, an old friend peddles
Fruits and tomatoes anew,
He speaks no more of matters
O’ the nite before, though true;

Hands are cut in the wind’s way,
And the ply-board, weathered and worn,
Speaks of Schumann’s distant tales
As if days past had not torn.

How many here do not pass,
How many wish not to see;
From the window, we spy a lass,
A fellow walks his dog, carefree.

How we once longed to flee
From this cage, far away,
And now I feel I can’t agree
And thou sayest “I can’t stay.”

I slither to’rd the dry river,
No rain kissed him these months,
A heated quarrel doth deliver,
‘Twixt a lady and priests in bunch.

I sidestep with lowered ears
And tread the cobbled stone;
They bicker o’er taxes, fears,
Moral strictures and power’s throne.

Here, as youth, I would race,
The river’s waters still flowed,
A shy path’s humble grace
With the scent of dung bestowed.

‘Tis I, and others, maybe ten,
Who know the loss we faced,
That stench that still clings to our ken,
That weary, darkened place.

I wait for a heavenly command
For a few fleeting minutes,
Shift a stone, and there I stand,
Count’n’ years that’ve evanesced.

How much it costs to treasure
The smallest things we hold dear,
How much loneliness we measure
After a thousand mornings clear.

‘Twixt the cracks, a gecko sleeps,
And the hostile pellitory creeps,
Plays upon my shadowed ground,
Soiling my thoughts, in and out.

I have lost my self within
The memories, a foggy mass;
Gently I caress the filter tip,
And vanish behind the glass.

I count my steps to the marble,
And sing a prose song fair,
Perhaps I’m calmer, more able,
Aged. I return home, there.

Sleepless, I set the couch with care,
A hand pressed firmly on my cheek,
A pillow rests upon my midriff,
And tales of tedium softly speak.

Yet I await the moon in vain,
While the sun’s far, out of sight,
Dreams and faiths locked away again,
And a glass full o’ wine by night.

I ponder it it’s not unwholesome
To speak of God quoting the Koran,
‘Twixt a Klimt painting and Janus’ bust,
For now I loathe the air we puffed,

And I sing it, pressing ivory keys,
Yet solitude feels odd within,
Perhaps the scent of your old perfume
Infused in these pages seems more bitter.

I have a hundred songs to declare my love
Yet I’d like you to see me doing alright;
I know meanwhile you’re in Milan,
Perhaps Canberra or by the Nile;

The Earth now seems a mere dot, small,
I yearn to seek you but am already gone,
And I shout at the mirror, at a man’s reflection,
Unknow to both, you and I, in essence.

I yawn, my thoughts come to a halt,
Perhaps the ground’s softer for the wreck,
The remnants I seem to have become.
Should also do wonders for my back.

Once more, grandad was right.
Again, I go to sleep without respite.

Thou spend’st thy hours on yet ‘nother mistake,
I notice thee from my frozen balcony,
For since yestereve, all warmth did forsake,
But, lo, we remain the same old souls, truly.

How easy it becomes to harbor disdain
After millennia spent in a love’s embrace,
Perchance ‘tis but weariness that doth reign
O’er the one thing for which we ought to face.

I throw away my minutes on another channel,
Thou mark’st me by the tomb-like silence
That wraps round thy steps and thy crystal panel,
But, lo, we remain the same old souls, hence:

I, the usual, unstable, meager poet,
With pockets full of rhymes and tales;
Thou, a soul so pure and quiet,
Whom I have wounded with countless travails.

The anthill stirs with the morning light,
Though early it seemed from my lofty edge.
The scholar doth peer with a gaze so slight
At a bulb in cold formalin’s embrace,
Then descends the stairs, a measured pace,
With sheaves of paper in hand.
From here I espy the crowded race
O’ the anthill’s roads, mindless jam.
Through a window, thick and grand,
Two men lie still on the parquet floor,
A crimson stain on the couch doth stand,
And two cups of coffee, steaming, no more.
The anthill blackens, with soot and mire,
And I gaze on, a touch forlorn, and muse
If ‘tis just to judge myself with ire,
Thinking myself the higher, I’m confused,
Yet, still, I am but a pigeon.

Sarah, what shifts with the turning year
After all the ones you’ve left behind?
You’ve shaped me into one I fear,
A soul that’s darker and far less kind.

I prattle on with a thousand faces,
In a present wrapped in joyful scenes,
Of you who ignore me, I do the same,
A glance from the corn’r, your touch unseen.

In September it rained, as it always hath done,
Even under the umbrella I shattered in gale,
Yet one fleeting moment with you has stung
Far worse than long years of silent travail.

Sarah, what changes if I now stay mute,
If I wander afar or alter my face?
Sarah, how do I banish this woodworm?
Sarah, what would you want me to do?

Aye, ‘tis strange, it grows dark at four,
Thou clingest to the tea, in thine old vice,
The cat’s eyes are lost in the fog, once more,
While I, in my garb, preach counsel unwise;

Thou heed’st me not, yet dost thou hear,
How for a month or so, mayhap,
We dwell together but drift no near,
I, the thorn, and thou, the rose ‘n my trap.

Aye, ‘tis strange, still dark at four,
Thou clingest to me with a whispered “nay”,
I smoke, lost upon the roof’s old floor,
Thou, lost within thy pages o’ yesterday;

And I heed thee not, yet do I feel,
How after this eve, so bitter and plain,
We’ll be but a breath in the wind’s cold keel,
Never the same, never the same again.

Like ripples on coffee, I turn in vain,
Philosophizing idly on the mundane,
‘Tween my old leather-bound tome
And walls o’ paper and synthetic foam.
A flame alone ne’er makes a fire,
Nor does a deluge birth a lake entire.
At times, I feel a caged-up mouse,
Dreaming to be a rare beast espied,
Yet in a cage I might still abide,
With illusions of being something more,
Like my verses, those lacking a core,
For there, mayhap, is naught to explain.
Even the boughs do fall this month,
Which I spend ‘twixt bars of golds;
The key lies hidden in the folds,
Of pages and rhymes, the same ol’ show.

I’ve torn wide my breastbone to grasp for air.
In the prelude, the poet succumbs to his fate,
Though the pianissimo does not yet fare,
The orchestra swells and brighten the stage.
I recite the script, yet falter the lines,
The theatre responds with thunderous applause,
From the wings, they unleash the hounds;
And I’m but meat for presses and scribes.
I change my form, no longer in verse,
In the end, they demand a corpse in a hearse,
Though they dress me in white, a saintly guise,
I lie ‘mong the worms, wrapped in ashen skies.
I forget the script, from scratch I begin,
The theatre rises, all on their feet,
A beam from the stage, and then I speak,
“Life outpaces you once you’re seated in defeat.”

So easily do I retreat in wrath
That days may pass with nary a word.
I’ve built a moat ‘round my castle o’ sand,
And wish the rain on others would flood.

Yet, why I suffer, even I cannot say,
Perhaps ‘tis but a maddening obsession;
I’m a sight unfit for eyes, a dismay,
With knuckles white from sheer suppression.

I once believed that writing had a cause,
Beyond mere pride now lost in air,
To leave behind views, landscapes, a pause,
Lives lived, loved, and laid bare.

I thought time would creep more slow,
Yet here at thirty, I clutch my pillow,
Feigning strength where none does show,
Speaking to the darkness, awaiting the glow.

Yet, we, the privileged, speak still in rhyme,
Whose greatest grief or defeat of late
Is but the headache that tolls the chime
Of morning’s curse, our cursed fate.

We have all and nothing, a strange plight,
Beyond our ten crates of Aspirin stored,
And still, we gnash our teeth with spite,
Even ‘gainst the mailwoman’s accord.

So easily do I now turn to be alone,
That sometimes I speak not to myself,
And the worst o’ my woes, now overblown,
Is the man staring back from the shelf.

The room spins ‘round ‘pon the rug
While the world sleeps in stillness, here,
To watch me, foolish and much too snug,
As I curse that beautiful full moon’s leer.

My temple throbs against the door,
While time, this eve, drags on, much slower,
And in my pocket some paint I bore,
With a brush, and thoughts much lower.

Let us blend into the night, I pray,
I care not for your morrow’s climbs,
But for laughter, and to piss away
With vagrants who threaten a fight.

It’s been years since you fled your bed,
And many more since you smoked a joint,
For again more you’ve held me mute, at a point,
Begging “For once, be an adult, instead!”

But what’s the change if I steal you away
For one night only, as you dive again,
Into closets, torn ‘twixt gloves and veils,
Missing spring as it passes by your day.

I spoke to you of life’s true decades,
With bandanas on brows, insults to yell,
At scums like us, yet donned in uniforms well,
You taught me of poets’ happier cascades,

Though perhaps you knew none deep within,
Yet blushing, standing tall, immersed in tales
Of things you no longer speak, or spin,
Hours we spent, now lost like whispers’ trails.

Let us merge with the naught for just two hours,
Then I’ll leave you to return to your cherry tree,
Smoothed by your arm and lifeless routine,
Passed from your father’s empty powers.

Perhaps, nay, indeed, I knew it from the start,
That beyond me, even your mind you’ve lost,
I who loved you beyond any other part,
After ten long years, I fear, I’ve reached the cost.

Today I lived not, my dear,
Time was spent, my throat so tight,
Dragging me back near
Your home of quiet fights.

Within me lies and airport of wax,
And though I know you’re not alone,
Forgive me, should I crack,
For tonight I long to moan.

Even though the glider dips,
Its wings now drip with glue,
Your breath, a gale that rips,
Leaves me unsure where to pursue.

Today I’ve failed again, take aim,
For my glider does not soar,
But if perchance it soothes your blame,
I’ve kept your picture near my core.

I’ve scuffed the corner of my shoes
To return another morrow
To retrace my steps
And feign knowledge of how
To mend the errors I borrow.

The pictures of this moment
Are kept sealed in my oven,
Awaiting the end
Of the winter’s chase
So my memories won’t fade.

I hold you still in the halo on the wall,
From that night when you drank too deep,
And the ink was a lump within your palm,
A mark beneath Castro’s poster; we grinned.

Yet they are but thoughts of a life now spent
You say I fear too much to forget.

We stand but six steps from the foulest shore,
Imagining the snow in October’s chill,
A tanker looms where the port waters pour,
And on balconies, flags sway at will.

Perhaps I miss gazing ‘pon the gray
Of walls tainted by buses and brine,
Those shutters of smoke and paint
From where I watched you sleep and lie.

I was twenty, with vices and mind,
You a bit younger, though never confessed,
But already I rued those words entwined,
Claiming the world was with you at its best.

If now I could take you aside and reveal,
Yes, ‘tis true the world changed in your embrace,
But, my love, it’s now a wound that won’t heal
For you’ve darkened it more with your grace.

What meaning hath our severance now,
When yestermorn no crossroads lay?
When walls were not as limits, how
Can courage be the price to pay?
To leap across the river’s breadth,
The widest stretch, yet fear to fall,
To drench our shoes, or mask of death
Thou’st donned since October’s pall.
From the old train station’s gate,
I wait where thou dost oft emerge,
From shortcuts thou dost navigate,
As once we fled the law’s grim scourge.
And in the note I penned to thee
On faded ads for strawberry cream
And cakes we never even did eat,
There lingers the memory of that dream.

It grates upon me when you depart,
When I know the doubts I pen and store,
Within these diaries of my heart,
Are naught but foolish thoughts of yore.

To you, a day is all you need,
To remind me through your playful air,
Or when you sleep, your breath at ease,
I watch in silence, lost in care.

Your carriage rolls, unaware,
Of the treasure it doth bear along,
I spend a month, a season’s fare,
Seeking the door where you belong.

Though blame is not yours, not at all,
Yet sometimes I accuse in jest,
A touch of hypochondria’s thrall,
Fearing each turn might leave me pressed.

But you prove me wrong each time,
And I laugh before the mirror’s face,
With an honorary degree in rhymes,
A madman restored to rightful place.

How many days shall pass away,
Between the courtyard and the loft,
As I sing of burdens to those who stray,
Who neither listen nor speak soft.

How many verses shall I weave,
With naught to say, no truth to reveal,
What must be said, I do not grieve,
Or perhaps, I choose to keep it sealed.

For years I’ve waited, watched the door,
Yet you had already arrived,
My problem now, I face no more,
For I can now really call it life.

The chamber’s walls do crooked stand,
Beneath the weight of sighs and breath,
They close upon the lifeless band,
Stretched out, awaiting whims of death,
And death once betrayed them, time ago,
When, misled by promised light,
They crossed a threshold, not to know,
Beyond, no hopes would e’er alight.

Bare feet trudge amidst the sound
Of whispering bones and dust entwined.
Pitch black bugs in the underground,
And mold on walls once pure and white.
At the far end, an altar gleams
Of gold and blood, o’er corpses piled,
Which now without tongues, it seems,
Draw near my wrists with whispers wild.

I dart onto the counter’s plane,
Grasping a candelabra tight,
Behind, awakes a marble swain,
An Adonis with Perseus’ might.
I scrape along the altar’s side,
To’rd the vast, behind the organ’s frame,
Yet in my mouth, fate melts inside,
Seeing the dead pursue my name.

I run, but slow, my thighs like lead,
My body’s an anchor by the shrine,
Assaulted by that stronger dead
Adonis, whose breath merges with mine.
The clamor of silence then descends,
The meager throng begins to roar;
They cloak my form in absinthe blends,
A blade descends—the dream’s no more.

The keel, torn asunder on the stone,
Doth drink of salt, of fish, of chain.
My chest of thalers and dreams hath flown,
And resteth on the ocean’s main.

I heed it not, for the helm now guides,
As distant fade the isles of yore.
One oar and shoe are lost in tides,
I clench my teeth, my hands grow sore.

The sea, aglow with crimson light,
Opens wide, yet leaves me dry,
But waters pierce like swords in flight,
As I cling to a mast awry,

Awaiting a wave, colossal and grand,
If any god doth heed my prayer,
To cast me upon some foreign strand,
Though my limbs be spent and bare.

With foam encircling eyes that weep,
I craft shapes of shadow and cries,
And two figures from the murk do creep,
Grasping my sides with weary sighs;

One is the man I’ve ne’er become,
Honest and brave in years gone by,
The other, perhaps, an elder form,
With glassy pupils, fingers dry.

Air fills my chest once more with pain,
My fingers yearn for the ancient helm,
Then I awake, in terror’s chain,
My legs like marble, heart o’erwhelmed.

One doth gaze, in white arrayed,
The other sits ‘pon a mossy stone,
His weary soul by the sea delayed,
Points forward where a grave is shown.

Must I die yet again, to be reborn,
In hopes of becoming something more?
The youth doth listen, a candle is sworn,
The elder sharpens an old, dull sword.

The beach doth speak in crashing waves,
In silence we stand, thoughts profound,
I rise, and soon, as the ocean raves,
We approach the grave, I seek some ground.

The group unites, the sun doth scorch
The hand that grips the wooden blade,
I wonder why the axe must torch,
When not e’en the handle’s fit for trade.

But from the woods, an aurora gleams,
The weapon falls, I bow to light.
A lady forms from shadowy beams,
With fair, pale skin and ravened sight.

She speaketh not, yet words are formed,
Of truths I know, but comprehend not,
I gaze at her, my heart now warmed,
And near her presence, trembling, caught.

I seek her gaze, in hope to find
Answers for sails and unknown shores,
Praying this isle, where I’m confined,
Be not the wellspring of darkened cores.

Her visage dawns, but at my height,
The world turns black, my chest doth sting,
I fall to knees, bereft of might,
And curse the void that pain doth bring.

That sense of naught behind my back
Doth loose my grip on stone and fate,
A thunderclap, a madman’s crack,
Paints darkness, and I wake too late.

The bed still warm, yet cold with dread,
And thou not near, as once thou wert,
I search the ether, rise from bed,
And wait for morn, though fears do spurt.

On the edge of the world, where I once sung
At twenty years or somewhat less,
When life was lived, with laughter sprung,
And every glass but half undressed.

Yet always doth the physics’ law
Reject the dreams illogic weaves,
So now I speak of us in verse,
While thou in dreamtides art received.

What wouldst thou have it be?
I’ve but adorned, with newsprint scattered,
The photograph, thou and me,
Caught in a storm, our hearts unbattered,
On an immortal day of mad revelry,
When thou didst not wish me ill,
Fleeing from history and economy,
To rehearse our tongues with skill
Upon my stair, wild and free.

Dost thou recall when once I spake
Of all the gravity’s silent weight,
Of complications that doth awake,
In flights of fancy that oft sedate,

When thou wouldst ne’er incline thine ear,
But like a monk, serene and still,
Admired my bonsai, so austere,
With branches wild, defying will?

Yet I took no ire nor bitter stance,
For ‘twas enough to have thee near,
And knew thou saw’st in e’ry glance,
Thy bridal gown, so white, so clear.

In twilight’s fading, dim embrace,
I showed thee proud, the river’s course,
Winding ‘tween tracks, in dark disgrace,
Through algae’s clutch and tar’s black force.

Thou gazed upon it, sorrow-filled,
Half envious, half amazed to see
The life I lived by comfort stilled,
A hermit’s dull serenity.

I’ve ne’er understood, as man unskilled,
Though I speak in words refined,
Why still my nature is unfulfilled,
In solitude, by choice confined.

Perhaps we are too far apart,
More distant than the poles themselves,
Who should be locked, both mind and heart,
In some pentagon’s secret shelf.

I’ve lost the count, the verses spent,
Drowned in tiramisu’s sweet hold,
Upon my bed, where dreams lament,
And where thy robe, blue-tinged and cold,

Still lies, a relic of our past,
Its folds unfurl with morning’s breath,
As arrows on a helm amassed,
Or whispers of a soldier’s death.

Now I wonder, dost thou think
Of me as thou roam’st far and wide,
From Spain’s warm shores to Australia’s brink,
With naught but thy bag by the side?

Where should I carve the words unsaid,
The thoughts that swirl, yet find no rest,
Words I’d scrawl in bold or thread,
In every place, at thy behest.

For ‘tis clear, beyond all doubt,
To each reader who may explore,
That though I name no place throughout,
They’d seek thee, love, forevermore.

Not for pity, nor for grace,
But out of some deep empathy,
Though thousands of verses leave no trace,
Of the name that should sing of thee.

Now my bonsai’s gone from sight,
The balcony too, has met its end,
My bank account hath taken flight,
A brief purging, I did intend.

Yet still thy smile, faintly seen,
Hangs on the edges of my mind,
Yellowed by smoke, and all between,
The twelfth wonder, thou didst find.

I trudge along, the days begin
With curses thrown at morning’s light,
Then licorice gum to mask the sin,
And nicotine’s patches in the fight.

For thou knowest well my feeble state,
Before even I did comprehend,
I love the scent of kerosene’s fate,
And bask in triumphs without end.

I dodge the talk of mighty men,
And responsibilities too great,
As birthdays pass and fade again,
And humbleness, I do abate.

Admit, at last, thou didst love me,
When I had wearied of thy grey,
Thy Parisian tights, too prim, too free,
And thy visage, spotless, in its way.

‘Twas always my fault, this I knew,
From the very start, with clear intent,
But waiting for thy arms’ warm view,
Left me broken, discontent.

Perchance thou wert too slow to move,
While I sped forth with frantic pace,
Thou at the base, thy steps to prove,
Whilst I did smoke upon the brace.

Who doth say it is a sin
To see the world from heights apart,
E’en the eclipse of the solar spin,
Appears, at times, to light the heart.

Take heed, my love, of all I erred,
Of the complexities I did present,
Though in the coffin, lessons deferred,
May serve thee not, for they are spent.

Thou didst steal, yet scorn the lore,
Like snow upon a branch’s tip,
I erred that day, and even more,
When first I spake with love’s own grip.

Beneath the storm, they huddle tight,
With thoughts unspoken, words contrived,
Each believing they hold the light,
The one immortal, yet alive.

But as the seasons shift their ways,
So do their thoughts, like garb they change,
The finest views, like fleeting rays,
Are lost in words of shallow range.

Beneath umbrellas moods do turn,
The streets are drenched in dreams and brine,
Sulfur’s scent where rivers churn,
And all predict, as though divine,

The sun, the rain, the winds, the air,
No mid-seasons left, they declare,
That August vexes beyond compare,
Life drips from eaves with little care.

They fear the flood, yet still they herd,
A flock of damp, conflicting minds,
Beneath the station bar, absurd,
Cursing wine, salt, and nutshell grinds.

Their words but tools for empty talk,
Without true place, without true sound,
They speak of weather’s idle walk,
And TV’s dull and vacant round,

While plastic laughter fills the room,
Briefcases clutched in shallow gloom,
And outside, the downpour’s might
Is drowned by banter, devoid of light.

‘Tis the world’s lament that rises high,
From fragile blooms to crickets’ cry.

We lie for hours on dewy grass,
Making love in castles that shan’t last.

You speak of Kant, of Freud, of Hegel,
I speak of punk with formal angle.

You draw me close to the ocean’s edge,
And we laugh as sounds fill the wedge.

'Tis the world’s great sorrow you feel so deep,
When in silence you grasp me and seek,

To understand which god could allow such pain,
But, dear, there’s naught to explain.

With legs crossed as the lotus grows,
Upon a plaid of Scottish thread,
Thou color’st a camel in pinks and blues,
Whilst I devour a plum yogurt’s bed.

The rain pours down, both near and far,
Through every home, the land doth weep,
And here we lie, our arms ajar,
Kicking the remnants of a pine cone heap.

'Mongst sounds and hues, I smile and drift,
Lost in the hum of the television’s light,
Though thou know’st not how to silence its gift,
'Tis thou who watch’st me grow tonight.

The March sun rests on tufts of brown
Of the mimosa that none will claim,
And fades away on drunkards drowned,
Clinging to benches, lost in shame.

It sings its song on weekend’s eve,
O’er gleaming fruits in Martyrs’ Way,
Where my alien form doth weave,
Watched by those who sweat and sway.

Yet the wind that dances ‘round these parts,
Fears not the rhymes of scorn I chew,
As it combs through locks in fits and starts
Resettling strands that the gusts renew.

The sun here wanes, both shy and frail,
O’er branches that grasp at the empty air,
And on a tangerine, pale and stale,
That hangs indifferent to the ground’s despair.

The chatter of lives yet to be sown,
Upon a noble path of bricks,
And scents of those whose dreams have grown
To grasp the sense these songs affix.

Content we are to dwell in gloom,
And drift to sleep 'midst tales of yore,
Of witches, wizards, dark of doom,
In cold embrace, with words ignored

As if another chance might come,
To mend the folly, fix the slight,
As if our reasons were but numb,
And cause enough to set things right.

Soft and dark, the night awaits,
Perhaps of fate, perhaps of dreams,
I stretch upon my broken fates,
And wait for dawn’s redeeming beams.

You read again of Hume, and glance,
Distracted, at my pale, bare back
That I offer to your fleeting trance.
One night. Each night. The same old act.

How oft the myths beside us crept,
Once told by winds through crag and thyme,
Amongst the goats where echoes slept,
Till concrete drowned their ancient rhyme.

We were too old to understand
That fewer years could bring us mirth,
Of tales murmured in cellar’s land,
By grandsires wise in life and earth.

How oft the past returned to mind,
That strange, small past when elders spoke,
With candles dim, and hopes resigned,
Of Rome’s great empire turned to smoke.

We longed for wine, and knew the taste,
For we were of the age to crave it;
And now I’d rather rest embraced
By pillows than a cask of dark wit.

Yet how I think and how I weep,
Returning to that brick-bound keep,
‘Mid crimson scythes and muddy sweep,
Without the fear of soil too deep.

We had time enough before us, true,
Yet knew not how it would depart,
How school would steal the days we knew,
And leave so little in our grasp.

How heavy lay the mahogany,
Upon the snow-stained cobbled way,
As solemn faces passed by me
With briefest nods, and no words to say.

How much you knew in elder days,
Without the learning of great bards,
Building homes and mem’ries by gaze,
Ignoring priests’ fanciful shards.

We had a wealth of diamonds raw,
Polished only by patient hands,
Yet now I see them distant, far,
And miss them more than time withstands.

Perhaps the old thus feed their flame:
With wounds that ache, and fate’s decree.
Now in the mirror, brushing shame,
I see the old man I’ve come to be.

Mahogany seems a fitting choice,
Were I to ask you now, somehow,
To lend your bike and give me voice,
To pick the casket we should vow.

How plain the stone you chose to bear,
No farewell carved, no flourish dear,
While others flaunt their statues fair,
You chose a gray slab, which I revere.

We had a life that seemed so dull,
Yet now it stirs this melancholy,
As on your moss I rest my skull,
And watch our days slip, slowly, wholly.

And I, who as a grown man yearned,
To sit on leather, with pens of bone,
‘Round office walls, where thoughts are churned,
Perhaps an observatory to call my own.
I, who sought to unearth the past,
To rewrite it in the light of thought,
Amidst old teachers, wisdom amassed;
I, who as a man, wished naught
But to be a man—yet what is that,
In this very moment when I write,
If my voice still quivers at your sight,
If to seem mature remains my plight,
If still I linger, empty, lost. I…
I, who wished to grow and age,
And see a street bear my name at last,
Yet stand at the sill, in silent rage,
Envying those already dead.

The voices wane behind Mount Ursine,
As I lift the line from the rocky crest;
Seven-forty, not even a brine,
The water is warm, I ponder, undress.

From the deeper blue, a fairer sight,
The crimson gleam paints the sky’s dome,
'Mid clouds compelled to gather tight,
And a crescent moon veiled in gloam.

How much we mortals err each day,
Unseeing, unaware—too true.
Blind, selfish beasts, we lose our way,
Seeking apples where pears once grew.

We choose a wall when caught in wrong,
Yet when the error’s plain to see,
We claim the fault—where fools belong.
I’ll leave the judgment to posterity.

Who knows they nothing know, yet speaks,
Dreams aloud in tyrant’s tone,
Judging, childlike, reckless, weak,
Neglecting needs not of their own.

Who knows not they know naught, and yet
Can’t grasp the right or wrong at hand,
Would, even to Christ upon the cross, forget
To offer a crust of bread, so grand.

Who’s white, green, a nationalist proud,
Training sharks within a moat,
Of hidden clauses, never loud,
To keep a refugee afloat.

Who sins through gluttony, all else done,
And points at saints, mascarpone-stained,
As if no penance need be won
While holy virtues are disdained.

Who studies life shut up at home,
Preaching manure without a thought,
Denies both God and Satan’s tome,
Choosing logic, friends forgot.

Who’s friends with many, yet come morn,
Remembers not a single name,
Keeps a rope, two photos torn,
And a bottle for the blame.

Who steals even from death itself,
Has hunger yet at night won’t eat,
For tomorrow’s fate turns on the shelf,
Perhaps a rigged poker’s beat.

Who hires but never pays the wage,
Drives distracted by a new construction,
His pen upon a contract’s page,
And feels himself an emperor’s function.

Who’s like me, a bit of all,
Yet too little for Dante’s pain,
But if my place in mourning’s pall
You find, speak of things more vain;

For I hear nothing from the deep,
Where I’ve chosen my grain-filled bed.
Let me in silence gently seep
Into the words I left unsaid.

I’m egocentric, deviant, cruel,
Or as we humans say—just right.
Perhaps that’s what I’ve always rued,
To know I’m not a special light.

What a sorrowful Sunday beneath the sun,
With salty drops carried by the breeze;
I bear a hardened shield of words undone,
For I’ve penned them a thousand times with ease.

I watch the hours groan behind the pane,
The pendulum’s glass, fogged and smeared,
St. Peter’s calendar stands void and plain,
And in the air, the scent of marjoram is seared.

The neighbors sleep as noon draws near,
While we’ve been awake since sirens’ first call.
In ten minutes, I’ll roast the chicken here,
And we’ll ponder how to hate this calm.

What a dreary winter Sunday we share,
Amid quarrels and pacifiers’ empty pleas.
Perhaps today’s but a frail tether to bear,
Between tomorrows just worse than these.

The bells echo sadly in the narrow streets,
Sounding even more forlorn than we,
As we await our meal, our silence greets,
I dressed for the office, you a cowboy to be.

What a bleak month to spend together,
How the umbrella at the door annoys,
I speak of the weather, you wish for better,
And perhaps it might soothe my crooked joys.

Not even football do I seek on the screen,
For today, I limit myself to idle and drear.
Maybe I’ll take you where memories have been,
To that slide you call, where prisons appear.

I miss you more when you’re by my side,
For I think on how distant I once had been,
At twenty-three years, with promises tied,
But none kept, as the days have thinned.

What a sad day to speak of all this,
Tomorrow I’d lose the thread once more,
Back to the office, where meats are the gist,
While you live in your world of preschool lore.

You teach me how good it can be
To waste time lying flat on the floor,
To sweep under the rug all the misery
Of a life that’s like bars closing more.

What a useless Sunday for those who live,
Yet perhaps I’ve learned more than enough,
For now, you admire me, with words you give,
How I love those who walk through life rough.

Let me remember you just as now,
As I weep while watching you within,
With your thing colored like dawn somehow,
And your socks mismatched, so akin.

It kills me faster to see you grow
In the world of adults, pushing through,
Than to choke on a cigarette’s slow woe,
And a coffee laced with Sambuca’s hue.

Even in this dull Sunday, you rise,
Amid doodles, pencil shavings, and smiles,
And though I teach you to count to ten,
Remind me, dear, which of us is the child.

I hardly can craft a poem new
For I am bound to my constant form,
The perfect lines are not mine, it’s true,
Stolen and kept without alarm;

And how hard it is to speak of days
That march along in dull parade,
To paint the tedium with strokes ablaze;
Describing the mundane, in truth, betrays.

We never learned a trade to ply,
For Grandma urged the college path,
Yet she clung to the war, and Battiato’s cry,
And I, in study, still lack the craft.

So many of us, with knowledge slight,
Enough to cast a vote, or maybe not,
For though we were many in that fight,
We end with ministers of retro thought.

And I once vowed, “Now, things will change,”
But where Guevara’s bandana is, I know not,
The punk and goth posters, once not so strange,
Lie buried in a chest of coffee-stained plot.

We have yet to grasp revolution’s hand,
Or maybe it’s not our place to win,
For pensions don’t knock at the stand,
Perhaps it’s better to sail and sin.

But Grandma would say, “Don’t venture far,”
Though the world around her spoke otherwise,
I had just enough for a smoking cigar,
Yet from France, the descent seemed wise.

But I can’t pen songs worth a tune,
Not of pain that loving a girl can weave,
When wealth was promised under the moon,
In inheritances I’d never believe.

So, I left without a farewell call,
When Grandma forgot how to sing,
And still, I write in rhyme, for a bride or thrall
That might arrive with the coming spring.

I pen books I never read nor heed,
But children, they do not eat the scroll,
At the thirtieth interview, I plead,
Talking to walls that heed my soul.

For still, I know not how to live right,
Weighing barely a bag of flour now,
Ever weaker, I stand to fight
With too much and nothing upon my brow.

What if I’d taken those exams,
What if I’d boarded that train on time?
How much bread would diplomas grant,
And how much in empty thoughts I’d rhyme?

My friends now smile only in frames,
Though perhaps I never had them near,
No clothes, no women, no roaring flames,
Just half a can of lager in Sprite’s veneer.

And I know I shouldn’t dare complain,
Considering the world and all its woes,
But come month’s end, with no savings to gain,
I indulge in foolishness, where luxury goes.

And Grandma, still she says today,
That times do change, but people do not,
We gaze upon the bust, in plaster gray,
Of her husband she kept in the dresser’s spot.

And perhaps I wished to stand with you,
In the sixties, loading trucks for the road,
Unaware of calculators and U2,
Collecting horrid souvenirs, as life flowed.

For I could never write as I should,
For you, verses never served a need,
No poetry’s needed to slay the wolves,
Nor psalms for the devil’s creed.

Had you two decades less, it’s true,
I’d have weeks of questions to share,
Asking, through the long night’s view,
How you lived without a shirt to wear.

I can’t even write a novel’s tale
Beyond a prologue, maybe a chapter or two,
For the mere thought makes me frail,
And a book dies in frivolous rues.

How much I’d say when dreams embrace,
But morning strikes with stones in hand,
Then work, children, bank, taxes chase,
And politics of shadows and shifting sand.

I needn’t name the fools by face,
To make you see who deserves no song,
And if I contradict, citing Matteo’s case,
It’s for lack of paper, B’s name’s too long.

But Grandpa voted with a grin so wide,
And never did I tell him why,
That his heart failed not by trousers’ pride,
Nor rap, nor Wi-Fi, but politics’ lie.

If we had seasons to waste away,
In talks about how wrong I’ve been,
I’d be the last to leave the fray,
For another deserves death, not kin.

And how much I’ve left unsaid to those
To whom I owed words most of all,
And how much I still say to those
Who deserve no words, and never will call.

From confessing falsehoods in the booth,
To now, knowing Dante’s tongue, and sober too,
It may be we can’t grow into truth,
For it’s simpler to be small, not new.

Perhaps we were raised by saints of old,
But it might have been better with Guccini’s voice,
At least we’d grasp the signs, bold and cold,
Facing them with our minds, not by choice.

Now, I speak in ancient ways,
Of a life I never lived in Provence,
Yet I know not French nor its phrases,
And wonder if there, they’ve lost their trance.

But at least I’d dine with lights aglow,
Without bills that climb to sky-high heights,
At least I’d write in rhyme and flow,
Without shame in words, or festive lights.

It could be the writers who raised me thus,
Those books not meant for study’s drill,
Or bullies, or slaps that came to us,
To know would save a bitter pill.

Yet still, I laugh, far too much at times,
At things one ought never to do,
Though gazing back on these ancient lines,
Perhaps I’ve loved civilization too.

No statue’s carved without a chisel’s bite,
Perhaps I should cease this endless script,
For like all, at the peak of life’s height,
I’ll forget it all, even life’s sweet trip.